OK, what's the deal with identity politics and is it justified, and by how much? Anyway, no group is immune, including straight whites. Anyway, the mark of this thinking is the insistence the group is always good, despite evidence. 😱 Also, there are massive thoughts of persecution and a "kill them before they kill us" mentality. 😡 OK, anyone familiar?
Identity Politics - Good, Bad, or Neutral?
- Thread starter Jason76
- Start date
D
Deleted member 5665
It's the left way to label anyone whatever they want to justify their hatred and position no matter how radicalize they are. Political identification is a system to control viewpoints and opinions.
But isn't the backlash just as horrible? Well, I wouldn't expect you to say yes.
D
Deleted member 5665
Backlash to oppose political identification? Well if we worried about backlash to opposing political identification we wouldn't have bothered fighting the Nazi's during World War 2 in fear of fighting those who thought they were politically correct. The leftists love political identification it justifies them to be violent and oppress any other form of other viewpoints.
Yes.
Anyways... the idea of "identity politics" even being a term or something that's up for debate is a bit ridiculous. Of course people's political ideologies, beliefs, and values are informed in part by their identities. At times those may differ from their affiliated political party. Identities are a major part of who a person is (they are who a person is) and so it obviously makes sense that that would come before any sort of party loyalty.
It's not a liberal thing, or a conservative thing, it's a human thing because we all have identities and have vested interests that are informed by those identities.
Identity politics does nothing good.
All I've ever seen it do is divide people into groups. Groups which are then used to weigh a person's contributions (or lackthereof) to society through. A single black female who goes to work and does ok for herself may still thought to be held back because of straight white men even if she's actually doing better than 80% of them. Meanwhile a single white man who does nothing is considered the ultimate bane of society. He's privileged for being a white man (having supposed power) and yet chastized for doing nothing.
I've seen, in forums, people's opinions having to be filtered through the lens of identity politics before they're allowed to speak and have an opinion. (Or rather what will happen is people will say "Oh, because you're an <race/group> you don't get to speak about this.") In which case it's used to "justify" racism. As if someone can't be racist because they belong to a particular group. (Anyone can be racist, it's not limited to one group. Acting like it can be is nonsense.)
Identity politics provides a convenient othering effect where by it makes attacking people not in your group easier. (Very similar to how actual Nazis in World War 2. They decried Jewish people as the cause of their problems, which allowed them to treat them poorly and eventually outright brutalize them.) Makes insulting and attacking others much easier when you think of them as sub-human and/or monsters.
All I've ever seen it do is divide people into groups. Groups which are then used to weigh a person's contributions (or lackthereof) to society through. A single black female who goes to work and does ok for herself may still thought to be held back because of straight white men even if she's actually doing better than 80% of them. Meanwhile a single white man who does nothing is considered the ultimate bane of society. He's privileged for being a white man (having supposed power) and yet chastized for doing nothing.
I've seen, in forums, people's opinions having to be filtered through the lens of identity politics before they're allowed to speak and have an opinion. (Or rather what will happen is people will say "Oh, because you're an <race/group> you don't get to speak about this.") In which case it's used to "justify" racism. As if someone can't be racist because they belong to a particular group. (Anyone can be racist, it's not limited to one group. Acting like it can be is nonsense.)
Identity politics provides a convenient othering effect where by it makes attacking people not in your group easier. (Very similar to how actual Nazis in World War 2. They decried Jewish people as the cause of their problems, which allowed them to treat them poorly and eventually outright brutalize them.) Makes insulting and attacking others much easier when you think of them as sub-human and/or monsters.
This is factually incorrect. I'll explain this as simply as I can, because this is a common myth that needs to be debunked.
Racism, and other -isms, are acts of oppression. Oppression requires two things: discrimination and power. Many people often think of racism, sexism, etc. as just discrimination based on race, sex, and so on. No. That is just simply called discrimination. By that, you are right - a black person can discriminate against a white person, a woman can discriminate against a man, but that doesn't make those racism or sexism respectively. It just makes them acts of discrimination.
Looking at the power component more closely, let me explain what that means. In order for it to be considered oppression, and therefore racism/sexism/etc., there must be a dominant power dynamic at play. So, because a white man has privilege that a black woman does not, their acts of discrimination would be considered racism/sexism (depending on what it is). Privilege, as a side note, does not mean that the white man in this example is better off than the specific black woman. It just means the white man does not experience the same systemic barriers and obstacles as someone who is black and/or a woman. Furthermore, in this example we are also seeing intersectionality because the black woman has too marginalized identities that are intertwined and make the racism and sexism she experiences that much worse than say, what a white woman or black man would experience (because both of those people have some privilege that the black woman does not.
A real-time example of this is a woman saying to a man "man up" or "be a man." This is wrong and problematic. But it isn't sexism. Sexism would be the man saying something like "stay in the kitchen" to the woman. This, however, is just a case of discrimination and bias. It is an issue that needs to be addressed, and men shouldn't be forced into a stereotype of "manliness" but it doesn't qualify as sexism or oppression. It does, however, perpetuate gender norms and gender roles, which further oppresses women into an inferior role in society. And that perpetuates and allows sexism to continue to exist. By saying man up, the woman contributed to a sexist society and allowed for it to continue to be accepted, but did not directly commit an act of sexism herself.
Reverse racism is not a thing. It's either racism (when discrimination and power are both present) or it isn't.
What is really meant is "be mature". Surely plenty of women, and I don't mean masculine ones, are very mature - while plenty of guys are lazy and cowardly.
The problem is that people are lumped into groups that do not represent who they actually are. Everyone is categorized and marketed to based on bland labels. If someone is hispanic, then they're supposed to vote for candidate X, and if they're white, they're supposed to vote for candidate Y. This ignores that people are, in fact, unique, and capable of making their own choices. It divides people into shallow categories of skin color, origin, and biological sex, when those things are only a small part of who we are as people.
Last edited:
What about the unsaid people who are neutral?
The movie PCU (Politically Correct University) seemed to make fun of this. Basically, it was the voice of college students who were just there to get an education and not indoctrinated or put into fights.
I have heard that definition before and, to be blunt, I don't buy it.
I have only ever seen people redefine sexism/racism to mean prejudice+power so they can can act in a way that would be racist/sexist but yet not suffer being saddled with being called as such. It's neither helpful nor useful. If anything it sets us back because it encourages people to be racist/sexist and pretend that they're not. I might even go so far as to say it rewards such behaviour.
It's how we get people like Bahar Mustafa.
I have only ever seen people redefine sexism/racism to mean prejudice+power so they can can act in a way that would be racist/sexist but yet not suffer being saddled with being called as such. It's neither helpful nor useful. If anything it sets us back because it encourages people to be racist/sexist and pretend that they're not. I might even go so far as to say it rewards such behaviour.
It's how we get people like Bahar Mustafa.
Yeah, but people can also claim the shouters of "identity politics" are also practicing the same!
They're still discriminating and that should be just as unacceptable to society.
And you can "not buy" the definition all day long, but it's not a product for sale. It's the factual truth and there are plenty of credible, scholarly sources to confirm that. Do your own research and you'll see that. I didn't just make it up.
Well, of course, racism especially, and lots of other things are wrong. They're just isn't any debating. But I think the "rubbing it in" by liberals has produced a horrible backlash. But of course, among the backlash are those who have always been racist jerks etc.. - even before the backlash! Those people are just trash!
Affiliates
